Toy Review - Studio Series LDR Blackout

[klystron]

Have this on pre-order (saving on impatience tax!). Think it looks fantastic in both modes, and as screen accurate a TF toy as we're ever likely to get. Blackout was always my favorite from the Bay movies.

But not thrilled by the 10min transformation time. Oh man, how I dislike puzzle-formers. I'm a Generations Brainstorm kinda collector. WFC Prime is probably my limit. More BW Razorbeast, less BW Magmatron.

[SharkyMcShark]

Have this on pre-order (saving on impatience tax!). Think it looks fantastic in both modes, and as screen accurate a TF toy as we're ever likely to get. Blackout was always my favorite from the Bay movies.

But not thrilled by the 10min transformation time. Oh man, how I dislike puzzle-formers. I'm a Generations Brainstorm kinda collector. WFC Prime is probably my limit. More BW Razorbeast, less BW Magmatron.

Honestly it's not that difficult or puzzly a transformation once you get a feel for the tips involved.

The arms are about as tricky as it gets, and even then the trick to making sure everything is aligned going back to vehicle mode is to make sure the USAF logos have been rotated to face the back.

The skirt armour needs to be raised all the way forward and the legs clicked forward all the way on their ratchets to be in the right position when you rotate them back. No counting the amount of clicks necessary, just make sure the skirt is all the way forward and then rotate the legs at the hip as far forward as they can go.

The only bits that are excessively paneltastic are the sides of the fuselage where the arm panels meet the feet panels, bit even there it's clear where everything goes and there are very helpful guiding slots and tabs. That part or not is about par with WFC Prime.

I'll time myself when I get home.

EDIT 4 minutes 23 seconds.

[klystron]

snip...
I'll time myself when I get home.

EDIT 4 minutes 23 seconds.

Ahhh, that makes me feel better. Thanks a bunch!


Gok - the challenge has been thrown down....

[Shirokaze]

After being super keen to get my hands on Blackout, I've ended up returning him to BigW; one of the legs failed to ratchet and just flopped around. They didn't have any more and I'm not going to bother pursuing another as I didn't feel that he was $70 worth of toy. The top-heaviness made it a pain to pose dynamically, the skinny legs (in comparison to everything above his waist) just felt weird in-hand and I hated that the shoulders wouldn't tab in like Goktimus mentioned. Would probably have felt better about it at a $40-50 price point.

[Magnus]

I've had this one for a while now, but never got around to typing my thoughts on it.

First up, he looks amazing in both modes. The MH-53 Pave Low was bigger than I was expecting, and there's something inherently satisfying about it as a result.

Perhaps I hadn't been paying too much attention to the characters legs, or I was just used to the old Voyager toy's legs, but I was surprised to see he had digitigrade-style legs, where he has a backwards-bending knee and then a forward-bending 'ankle' below the knee. The hands don't bother me, but I wish he had slimmer forearms - then again, there isn't really anywhere else to put those panels and fuel tank halves.

Functionally, the big issue I have with mine is that that the panels with the arms are held perhaps too securely to the torso - I can understand people being afraid of breaking something when transforming him to MH-53 mode and unfolding those panels from the torso. Perhaps my only other gripe is that I wish he had ranged weaponry, like a minigun on his forearm or the fold-out cannon on his chest.

I like the way they use the tail rotor but it's a bit far back to look like a dedicated weapon.

That's how I felt too, seeing the tail and rotor mounted on the left arm. To get around this, I mount the tail on the right arm to make the rotor more distal to the elbow; the rotor is now pretty much the same distance from the elbow as the wrist.

Transformation is involved but not ridiculous, certainly not the aneurysm-inducing fiddliness of ROTF Prime, but maybe something close to the Voyagers of that time. Selling these as Transformer's answer to the Star Wars 'Black Series' is a really smart move, it makes a statement to the customer that these are aimed at an older age bracket and gives them the green light for increased complexity. As much as I loved ROTF Prime, I always felt sorry for all the really young kids that would never have seen it in truck mode ever.

I wish I could find a quote, but my understanding was that the simpler transformations Hasbro/TakaraTOMY implemented for the Age of Extinction and The Last Knight toylines was a response to complaints that the movieverse toys were too complex for even some older children (although there may have also been an element of cost-cutting by reducing the part count and therefore keeping the toys at the desired price points). It's not hard to imagine some children giving up on transforming leader-class Optimus or Sentinel out of frustration.

[Sutton]

I wish I could find a quote, but my understanding was that the simpler transformations Hasbro/TakaraTOMY implemented for the Age of Extinction and The Last Knight toylines was a response to complaints that the movieverse toys were too complex for even some older children (although there may have also been an element of cost-cutting by reducing the part count and therefore keeping the toys at the desired price points). It's not hard to imagine some children giving up on transforming leader-class Optimus or Sentinel out of frustration.

You're correct, I read the same thing in an interview at some point, it also applied to Generations figures as well - some of those were fiddly to the point of frustration. I love transformations with 'cool moves' in them, but I love a confident transformation more. That is, I want to be clear that the part I've moved is where it needs to be, lined up flush and preferably with a satisfying click or firm tab. Blackout doesn't quite have that everywhere, but there's enough of those 'cool moves' to make me happy.

Slightly off-topic, but I think Hasbro did a really shrewd maneuver when they did the 'Combiner Wars' line, those figures by necessity needed to be more simplistic as they needed to be stable enough to be legs - therefore no torso transformations and limited leg transformations. That meant reduced part counts and costs but it had a good structural reason so fans (mostly) accepted it. After a couple of years of those figures and the fanbase/kids getting used to them, they were able to go ahead with Titans Returns, with those figures also having a similar level of simplification despite less structural justification for it - I can't think of many Titans Returns deluxes off the top of my head that have particularly tricky transformations.

Meanwhile the movie line has also simplified, with the 'Last Knight' figures in particular hitting most of the right notes - Voyager Prime, Megatron and Bulkhead come to mind as being really good at the 'Cool Move/Confident Click' thing.

Which is why these figures are so surprising - after spending the last 5 or 6 years trying to reduce the complexity and part counts in their designs, they go and make this line of figures that seems to fly in the face of their own brand direction, even going as far as to dramatically increase part/plastic content between figures at the same price point, in the same series, in the name of scale and screen accuracy. All very left-field but I'm definitely not complaining.

[i_amtrunks]

My six year old nephew got studio series Blackout and Stinger for his birthday...

Idiot people are idiots. While Blackout looks cool in both modes, it is not a child friendly toy in the slightest and the transformation is rather Diddy and the instructions are nearly as bad to see and understand as the blacked background Prime Wars figures.

I refused to transform stinger last night after spending half an hour on blackout (trying to get him out of a weird semi transformed state first!). I agreee that he has many nice steps that seem well planned but he still requires too many steps to be done millimeter perfect in the exact right order for my liking. A nice representation of the character but the original version was the far better toy, especially for a younger fan.

For the record, he loved the crash combiners, Prime Wars Slag and Swoop and the rescue bits he got from me and other family members who asked me for suggestions!

[Bemblebuu]

The transformation is a process, that is for sure. The 8+ age recommendation on these Studio Series seems pretty ambitious, as I would imagine plenty of people breaking these figures if they're not careful.

Totally agree about the instructions being awful. I prefer to transform the figures by winging it. If you take your time and see where all the folds and joints are, it's pretty easy to work it out.... Youtube videos on transformations exist if you can't follow the vague intructions.

[GoktimusPrime]

The age limit isn't about protecting the toys, it's about protecting the user. They may break the toy, but it's more about the toy not hurting the child - e.g. choking hazards etc.

[Bemblebuu]

The age limit isn't about protecting the toys, it's about protecting the user. They may break the toy, but it's more about the toy not hurting the child - e.g. choking hazards etc.

Most children aged 3 and above have the sense to not attempt to eat their toys...

...and if a child has the urge to swallow Scorponok, well... they deserve to choke.